much more than usual of those rules concerning the position of women
which belong peculiarly to an imperfect civilization." And he adds words
which come from a man who is a good Christian as well as a profound
student: "No society which preserves any tincture of Christian
institutions is likely to restore to married women the personal liberty
conferred on them by the middle Roman law."

Passing now to the Middle Ages, we find conditions curiously involved.
The exaltation of celibacy as the true condition for the religious, and
the consequent enormous increase of convents, placed fresh barriers in
the way of marriage; and the Church having attracted the gentle and
devoted among the women and the more intelligent among the men, the
reproduction of the species was for the most part still left to the
brutal and ignorant, thus leading to a survival of the unfittest to aid
in any advancement of the race.

The number of women far exceeded that of men, who died not only from
constant feuds and struggles, but from many pestilences, which
naturally, in a day when sanitary laws were unknown, ravaged the
country. Dr. Karl Bücher, commenting on the relation of this fact to the
life of women at that time, notes that from 1336 to 1400 thirty-two
years of plague occurred, forty-two between 1400 and 1500, and thirty
between 1500 and 1600. In addition to the convents, which received the
well-to-do, many towns established Bettina institutions, houses of God,
where destitute women were cared for; but it was impossible for all who
sought admittance to be provided for.

The feudal system, with its absolute power over its serfs, had driven
thousands into open revolt; and beggars, highwaymen, and robbers made
life perilous and trade impossible.